Font no longer supported in FrameMaker

[StefaniaKx]

I have been using Swiss Greek for many years in FrameMaker. However, since Swiss Greek is no longer supported, when I open my files, I get corrupted fonts and therefore unreadable content. This, can be solved (temporarily) if I install Swiss Greek again on my pc, which makes the content in the file readable (although underlined with red lines). The problem is that I can not replace that font with another legit, supported font. Replacing the font through the Paragraph Designer > Font, does not work. The font becomes corrupted again. Any idea of how replacing an unsupported font is done, would be highly appreciated. Thank you!

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

What version of FM are you running - always start with that info.

I haven't heard of any font that isn't "supported" anymore by FM - maybe you need to give some more details about the exact font name and type. And what do you mean that when you replace it with another, that the font is corrupted again? Never heard of that happening either. Corrupted how?

[StefaniaKx]

Hello, I am running FM11. Swiss Greek is a Type 1 font and Type 1 characters do no longer display in FM 11. This is how the content is displayed:

If I try to replace this with another font that is not Type 1, nothing changes. I hope this helps a bit.

[Jeff_Coatsworth]

What's the font that you're replacing it with? Does that font support the characters that you're trying to use in the doc? That might be the issue. However, this is out of my area of expertise (I don't use multiple fonts or languages), but @Bob_Niland might have more to offer.

[Winfried Reng]

Jeff, I think that's the correct question to ask! Only few fonts have Greek characters (apart from some symbols).

[Bob_Niland]

It appears that the problem here is being a legacy overlay/codepage font, and not, per se, being a Type1 font. It might have been IBM code page 813, Windows code page 737, 869, 1253 or 28597, or ISO/IEC 8859-7:2003.

Any code page Greek fonts put the Greek glyphs in the 0xA0-0xFF range of the font codespace, which is the Latin1 Extension range in ISO/IEC 8859-1 and Unicode fonts. Unicode fonts now usually populate the {modern} Greek glyphs in several ranges, mainly U+0370–U+03FF.

The elegant solution would be to revise all the Greek content to native Unicode. Hack below.

But it should be working. Despite the Type1 phase-out in progress, T1 fonts can still be installed on Windows, and still work in FM. Check the Paragraph and Character formats to ensure that the specific overlay font name is being invoked. see next reply for what happens when you don't.

If I had an old doc with a lot of overlay content, and had, or could render a PDF of it, I'd be tempted to re-OCR it, from PDF or print. The OCR would today use Unicode code points for the non-Latin characters, which could be copied back to the source document in great swaths.

[Bob_Niland]

Usually, when what was expected to be:
ΘΣΦξϖβΠЖЭЯБД🙑🙫🙞שאף or other non-Latin script
instead renders as glyphs from this set:
¡¢£¤¥¦§¨©ª«¬®¯°±²³´µ¶·¸¹º»¼½¾¿CxÀÁÂÃÄÅÆÇÈÉÊËÌÍÎÏDxÐÑÒÓÔÕÖ×ØÙÚÛÜÝÞßExàáâãäåæçèéêëìíîïFxðñòóôõö÷øùúûüýþÿ
the problem is very likely an overlay fail (Character Format | Font Family, or font instance not installed), and not a problem with the .pfb or .ttf itself.

[FrameMaker-dk]

Sounds like Swiss Greek fonts are Type 1. Is that right?

[mk-will]

Hi, @StefaniaKx ,

you already know what to do as you wrote "This, can be solved (temporarily) if I install Swiss Greek again on my pc, which makes the content in the file readable (although underlined with red lines)."

So install the SwissGreek font.

FrameMaker does support Type1 fonts (FM 11 anyway).

Or explain exactly what your problem with this font is.

"The font becomes corrupted again. "

How do you know?

Regards

Stephan

[FrameMaker-dk]

If one does a bit of googling there seems to be a fair amount of Swiss Greek fonts available for free download. Windows no longer supports Type 1 to its full extent. While you still can install a pfb file, results can be unpredictable. (in my experience, that is). "Swiss Greek" does sound like it is a copy of Helvetica made years ago and if you are lucky, I think you may be able to merely replace the font with a similar ttf font from a free download. Might be worth giving it a shot, at least.

[mk-will]

Hi, @FrameMaker-dk ,

"Windows no longer supports Type 1 to its full extent."

what version of windows are you talking about?

And what problem(s) do you encounter?

I am using Win10 22H2 (latest) and I have no problems with installing or using Type1 fonts.

"Problems" occur with specific software like latest Adobe CC versions (and someday in the future FM versions will stop supporting Type1 fonts), but with the older ones I can use Type1 fonts until now without any glitches.

In the long run, yes, Type1 fonts must be replaced with TTF/OTF versions.

Regards

Stephan

[FrameMaker-dk]

Yeah well... I am talking about Windows 10 and I have had problems involving proper rendering of Type 1 fonts too.

My advice was meant as a practical advice. If the thing does not work, perhaps it is better to exchange it with something that does work.